Secret New Government Initiative Announced Unintentionally

While recently attending yet another function held by the government designed to pointlessly spend taxpayers’ money, I found myself unexpectedly in deep conversation with the Minister for the Generation of Revenue. After a few glasses of the Château Margaux, the Minister let slip that the government is poised to implement an initiative more cunning than the time it tried to sell Antarctica to a passing American billionaire.

'This plan,' gabbled the Minister, 'can't fail. Even we won't be able to stuff this one up!'

Indeed, so excited was the Minister there were disgusting flecks of spittle at the corners of his mouth which I was hoping he might wipe off but which he instead just played at with his tongue.

As I was no doubt aware, the Minister chortled on, Australia had recently passed a law requiring all cigarettes to be sold in plain packages.

'If the Australians are stupid enough to be first up against the tobacco companies, it's hardly our fault, is it?' he chirped. 'Still, good on them for taking it on, and at the same time opening the door to us to make a whole lot of money!'

'What's that,' I said, 'a whole lot of money? Howso?'

'Well,' the Minister giggled, 'we've just secretly created a company that will serve as a front for the New Zealand government—no one will ever know that we actually own it!—and can you guess what this company is going to produce, on the cheap, in China?'

'Houses?' I suggested, thinking it would be a real vote-winner, although I couldn't see its immediate connection to cigarettes.

'Don't be stupid,' yelped the Minister, 'who needs cheap housing? No, no, this company will produce'—and here he paused for what I think was supposed to be dramatic effect, but became instead a chance for him to belch—'lots and lots and lots of bling bling cigarette cases!'

'Cigarette cases?' I cried, 'but who can live in a cigarette case?'

An early prototype of the cigarette cases to be produced by the NZ government

'Fool, they're not for living in, they're for people to express their individuality, to say, this is me, I'm incredibly interesting and clever and creative and have lots of money and whatever! Do you think people are going to stop smoking because cigarettes come in plain brown packages? Of course not! But don't  you also think they might like to be able to choose their very own cigarette cases—they'll even be able to personalise them if they want—and they can even have one for every occasion—it can't fail!'

By this time the Minister was more or less screaming at me in his breathless excitement and it was all I could do to avoid the flying bits of voulevant hurtling from his mouth.

'Do you mean to tell me,' I said, 'that the New Zealand government's contribution to reducing smoking will be to sell personalised cigarette cases so that consumers will be able to enjoy the sweet and soothing deliciousness of their favourite tobacco while also being able to express their individuality and personal style?'

'Yes!' thundered the Minister, 'brilliant, isn't it!'

'Rather!', I said. 

 

 

With an ideology clasped to your bosom....

 Another word for ‘ideology’ is ‘faith’. And the tremendously convenient thing about faith of any kind is that you don’t have to worry about anything as absurd as how the world actually is. With an ideology clasped reverently to your bosom, you can confidently step out into the world knowing that, whatever the reality, you have an answer for every question, wherever there is doubt, you have certainty, and where there is darkness, you’ll have a torch. To change t(r)ack, when one is imbued with the fierce flames of ideology, it is as if one is the boiler in a run-away steam train, hurtling uncontrollably down the tracks, destined to crash through the walls of reality as they loom one by one in front of you. And because you have faith, it just doesn’t matter!

Prime Minister John Key takes a moment to reflect on how much
the government's policies have increased his personal wealth.

 

All that is by way of saying that – yet again – New Zealand finds itself the passenger aboard an out-of-control ideologically-driven steam train, with a government shoving coal into the boiler with the furious intent of a madman. Hell-bent on pursuing the prescribed economic policies of yesteryear, the government is giving nary a thought to the possibility that, just perhaps, what they are doing is destroying whatever chance this country might have of salvaging the last vestiges of a functioning economy. But don’t take my word for. Take Bernard Hickey’s – for one thing, he’s very clever, and for another, his writings have all the pungency of sheer good sense. Read his article, and then look aghast at the shameless jib-jabbering of this government as it crashes through yet another wall, laughing the hysterical laugh of the ideological zealot.